Runway
New York AI research company building generative video and image models for filmmakers, artists, and enterprises.
- Artificial intelligence
- active
- Founded 2018
- Researched Sep 2026
The story
Runway was founded in 2018 by three NYU Tisch ITP classmates who set out to make machine learning tools usable for creators. It grew into one of the best-known generative-video AI labs, co-developing Stable Diffusion and later its own Gen-series video models, raising over half a billion dollars along the way.
Timeline
Founded at NYU ITP
Valenzuela, Matamala and Germanidis found Runway
Seed round raised
$2M seed to build ML tools for creators
Series A funding
$8.5M raised for AI media creation tools
Series B funding
$35M raised for AI video editing tools
Co-released Stable Diffusion
Co-developed open-source text-to-image model with CompVis/Stability AI
Series C at $500M valuation
$50M raised as generative AI interest grew
Series C extension, $1.5B valuation
$141M from Google, Nvidia, Salesforce Ventures
Launched iOS app
Mobile app for video-to-video generative AI
Lionsgate partnership
Custom model trained on Lionsgate's film catalog
Series D at $3B valuation
$308M led by General Atlantic; launched Gen-4
AMC Networks partnership
AI content and pre-visualization deal with AMC
Founders
Cristóbal Valenzuela
CEO and co-founder
Chilean; met co-founders at NYU Tisch ITP; wrote the 2025 Series D announcement
Anastasis Germanidis
CTO and co-founder
Greek; co-founded Runway after meeting at NYU Tisch ITP
Alejandro Matamala
Chief Design Officer (CDO) and co-founder
Chilean; co-founded Runway after meeting at NYU Tisch ITP